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Aussie Techs Threaten Chaos
tintinaujapon writes "The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting that NCR staff with key responsibility (among other things) for fast food & supermarket chains, banking ATMs, schools and baggage handling at Sydney airport are preparing to walk off the job next week, in industrial action aimed at resolving a pay dispute. NCR's general manager thinks few people in the general community will care about the plight of the palest workforce, but the union claims potential disruption and financial losses could be huge. The strike could last up to a week and is the most significant action yet taken in Australia by the techie workforce."
That's not FUD it's reality, cooperations right now as we speak are using the threat of lower prevailing wages in other countries to reduce peoples wages and benefits here in the U.S. A race to the bottom not only screws American workers but allows cooperations to exert downward pressure on wages globally as they frantically search for the cheapest labor market. Their goal is a return to the working conditions seen in Dicken's England, working conditions we are already seeing at U.S. owned multinationals like Nike in Indonesia, China, and Vietnam.
Globilization is just beginning to hit tech workers but if we let global corporations get away with it without organizing labor coders and other geeks will be the next victims of the global sweatshop. Hint a software engineer is paid about 15 dollars an hour in India. If that becomes the prevailing wage of IT work you can kiss your nice house and endless supply of cool new gadgets goodbye. Thomas Friedman's "flat earth" means YOU get flattned my friend.
Tired of all the isms, don't exploit people as an employer, or a government, mmmmK?
I think you need to retake history. The 40 hour work week was started by Henry Ford, prior to any unions being formed in his company...
Maybe this was the case in the USA, but in Australia and most of the rest of the industrialized world, the 40 hour work week was earned by unions. In Australia, the "8-hour day" was earned by a collective organization of stonemasons and building workers in Victoria in 1856. Demonstrations were then held by unions to win the same rights for other trades. By the 1880s, the 8-hour day was commonplace in Australia, and "8-hour day" parades were held throughout the late 19th century to celebrate the fact.
Nice try stooge for the owners, you are off by about 30 years, with accuracy like that your labor should be worth about 4 dollars an hour on the global market. It's all good until YOUR ox gets gored, right?
h tml
"The struggle for the shorter work week is the thread that ties together the history of American labor. The country's first union 1;the National Labor Union in 1866 issued its primary demand, "8 hours shall bethe normal work day." The NLU died. But the demand prompted action. In 1872 in New York City thousands of building trades workers stuck for the 40 hour week. Some won. But their g~~h-s were lost in a tide of depression. In 1877 Pittsburgh workers, led by striking rail workers, seized the city and adopted a shorter day. They were shot back to work by federal troops.
1886. Chicago. The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions (later the AFL) called for a national strike for the 8 hour day on May 1. Nearly one million American workers stopped work that day. The nations industrial centers were hushed. Transportation halted. Some employers yielded concessions. Others sighted their targets.
*******
In the 1890's, as wealthy families like the Morgans and Rockefellers tightened their monopolies in industry , Spies' words stood true. The first general strike in the deep south, led by an integrated workforce in New Orleans, won a shorter work day. In this period the U.S. waged two wars. We fought Spain. And the government waged a war on the Western Federation of Miners led by Big Bill Haywood. Casualties in the hundreds. couldn't stop the miners, historically among the most militant of all workers. They won the 8 hour day near the turn of the century."
http://www.pipeline.com/~rgibson/ShorterWorkWeek.
Tired of all the isms, don't exploit people as an employer, or a government, mmmmK?
I was googling on workchoice law. This is as per Queensland govt under "What does it mean for employees"
With these kind of laws I dont think they are doing anything wrong. Show solidarity to our tech brothers and sisters down under.
While it is true that Henry Ford took it upon himself to institute an 8 hour work day in 1914, it was not in a vacuum. Some unions were demanding first a 10 hour day, then later an 8 hour day throughout the 1800s.
The interesting thing is that after Ford started the 8 hour day, his competitors followed suit because Ford was achieving higher productivity as a result.
The Wikipedia article has more detail.
In 1924, a consitutional ammendment banning child labor failed to pass.
In 1938, the Wages and Hours (later Fair Labor Standards) Act was passed, banning child labor and setting the 40-hour work week.
There was a court challenge and and the Supreme Court upheld the law in 1941.
In 1835, child workers in employed in the silk mills in Paterson, NJ went on strike for the 11 hour day/6 day week.
In the 1886, the Knights of Labour marched with 80,000 people marched in support of the 8 hour day and in subsequent days, 350,000 workers went on strike.
It is true that Henry Ford paid better and had a shorter work day than other captains of industry.
He also hated unions and hoped treating workers better would help keep unions out of his factories.
But thousands and thousands of workers struck and marched before and after this. Both private police and workers were shot or beaten to death
as part of the struggle.
Many of the events had names like Bayview Massacre, and Thibodaux Massacre.
Local police, National Guard and federal troops have been called in to end strikes.
For their part, early unions hired people to beat up "scabs" and were not afraid of mob violence.
It seems so different than the world we live in today. I have ancestors who worked in the mills in Fall River, Massachusetts.
They were recent immigrants from Ireland and French Canada.
I went there once and visited a museum about the mills, there were pictures
of children with missing fingers working in the mills.
For the most part, people had to fight for an 8 hour day, overtime pay, and to have a childhood.
"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." -- Albert Einstein
... the sheer number of laws you'll have to pass (read: guns you'll have to stick in peoples' backs) to preserve your nationalist Utopia.
The Indian workers who replace your sorry ass won't be here on H1-Bs. They won't be here at all. They'll be in, gee, guess what, India, doing your job remotely.
More power to 'em, I say. If capitalism is good for the goose, it's good for the gander.
I think you need to retake history.
And you're just making up history. Ford was an early adopter, but was in no way the innovator. He adopted the 40-hour work week long after the American union movement made the 40 hour week one of the top agenda items of workers, along with higher wages, safer working conditions, etc.
The 1938 labor law was way behind the curve, as many unions had already obtained their demands in the workplace. Ford just knew which way the wind was blowing.
O lord, bless this thy holy hand grenade, that with it thou mayest blow thine enemies to tiny bits, in thy mercy.